Tamika Whitmore scored 14 of her 17 points in the first half, Asjha Jones and Lindsay Whalen had 16 each and the Connecticut Sun beat New York, 77-63, spoiling the Liberty's WNBA season opener. Jolene Anderson added 13 points, including 4-for-6 shooting on 3-pointers, for Connecticut (2-0).

• Rookie Charde Houston scored 21 points in her WNBA debut, and fellow first-year guard Candice Wiggins added 15 to help the Minnesota Lynx beat the veteran Detroit Shock, 84-70, in the season-opener for Minnesota. Former Minnesota player Katie Smith led Detroit with 17 points. Detroit was coming off an 85-66 victory against Houston in its home opener Saturday. Plenette Pierson added 15 for Detroit.

Ilya Kovalchuk scored his second goal of the game in overtime, giving Russia its first world hockey title since 1993 with a 5-4 win against Canada in Quebec City. Canada took a 4-2 lead into the third period, but couldn't hold off the Russians. Alexei Tereshchenko and Kovalchuk scored to tie it, setting the stage for the overtime winner. The world championship hasn't been won by the host country since the Soviet Union in 1986. Canada won the title a year ago in Moscow. The loss also ended a 17-game winning streak for Canada dating to the gold-medal win last year.

Rafael Nadal beat defending champion Roger Federer, 7-5, 6-7 (3), 6-3, to win the Hamburg Masters in Germany and add the only major clay-court title missing from his impressive collection. It was the reverse of last year's final, when Federer won his fourth title in Hamburg and snapped Nadal's 81-match winning streak on clay.

• Jelena Jankovic overcame a pain in her neck and French teenager Alize Cornet to win the Italian Open in Rome for the second year in a row. The victory will help Jankovic, who beat Cornet, 6-2, 6-2, establish herself as a serious contender for the French Open, which begins next weekend.

The Washington Wild Things opened their Frontier League season with a 6-5, 10-inning loss to the host Chillicothe Paints. Chris Sidick went 2 for 3 with a home run for the Wild Things.

Track and field

Jenn Stuczynski, 25, from Churchville, N.Y., broke her American record in the pole vault at the Adidas Track Classic in Carson, Calif., outshining Tyson Gay's sweep of the 100 and 200 meters and other strong performances by a powerhouse field at the Adidas Track Classic. Stuczynski cleared 16 feet,  3/4 inches to break the mark of 16-0 she set last year in the Reebok Grand Prix in New York. Only world record holder Yelena Isinbayeva has gone higher. Stuczynski missed three times at a world record 16-5 1/2.

Fred Roumbanis won the Bassmaster Elite Series' Carolina Clash on Lake Murray in Columbia, S.C., using a five-fish limit of 17 pounds, 14 ounces to hold off Steve Kennedy. Roumbanis, from Bixby, Okla., finished with a four-day total of 66-13, while Kennedy, from Auburn, Ala., had a catch of 65-4.